You may have seen in the news that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is suing Microsoft for allegedly misleading 2.7 million customers. The case claims Microsoft hid cheaper, AI-free subscription plans and forced users onto more expensive plans by making AI integration a mandatory part of Microsoft 365 subscriptions.
Please note – this is about Microsoft Home Premium licenses not Office 365 Business Licenses.
A Microsoft Home Premium license is primarily used by home users to license the Microsoft Office Suite – Word, Excel, Outlook, etc
You also get 1TB of space for OneDrive and now some CoPilot credits.
See https://warringahit.com.au/office/
An Office 365 Business license is primarily for your own domain setup for email, OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams etc.
See https://warringahit.com.au/365-licenses/
The class action claims Microsoft mislead customers by charging more for their Office 365 Home Premium renewal by bundling limited access to CoPilot.
The ACCC alleges that Microsoft concealed the option for consumers to switch to a less expensive subscription, known as the classic plan, which did not include Copilot.
For those of you using Office 365 Home Premium, your recent subscription was more expensive. We are waiting to see how to renew in the future without the CoPilot integration.
For those of you using Office 365 Business, nothing has changed and there is nothing you need to do.